One of the first acts of the new king was to grant Letters Patent absolving the City of all trespasses committed before the date of his accession,1026 and to offer restitution to all who had suffered at the hands of Empson and Dudley or their agents. Empson and Dudley were themselves committed to the Tower and afterwards executed. In the meantime an enquiry was opened in the city as to recent proceedings against Capel and others.
It was found that six men, whose names were John Derby, alias Wright, a bowyer, Richard Smyth, a carpenter, William Sympson, a fuller, Henry Stokton, a fishmonger, Thomas Yong, a saddler, and Robert Jakes, a shearman—all of whom had more than once been convicted of perjury, and on that account been struck off inquests—had contrived to get themselves replaced on the panel, and had been the chief movers in the recent actions against the late mayor and other officers of the city. They had, moreover, taken bribes for concealment of offences of forestalling and regrating. Being found guilty, on their own confession, of having brought false charges against many of the aldermen, the Court of Common Council adjudged the whole of the accused to be disfranchised. Three of them, who were found more[pg 344] guilty than the rest, were sentenced to be taken from prison on the next market day, on horseback, without saddles, and with their faces turned towards the horses' tails, to the pillory on Cornhill. There they were to be set "their heddes in the holys" until proclamation of their crime and sentence was read. The lesser offenders were spared the pillory, but were condemned to attend on horseback at Cornhill, whence all the offenders were conducted to the Standard in Fleet Street "by the most high ways," where the proclamation was again read. The culprits were then taken back to prison and made to abjure the city on pain of imprisonment at the pleasure of the mayor and aldermen.1027 Among the charges brought against Derby was one to the effect that being on a jury he had received the sum of ten shillings and "a quarter of ffisshe for his howsehold," a bribe which a suitor had tendered by the advice and counsel of Thomas Yong, saddler, who was apparently acting as Derby's accomplice.1028
On the occasion of the king's coronation, which took place on Midsummer-day soon after his marriage with Catherine of Aragon, his brother's widow, the citizens presented the king and queen with the sum of £1,000 or 1,500 marks. Two-thirds of the gift was given expressly to the king, the remaining one-third being a tribute of respect to the queen. The money was to be raised in the city by way of a fifteenth, but the poor were not to be assessed.1029 The procession from the Tower to Westminster was equal[pg 345] to, if it did not surpass, any spectacle that had yet been witnessed in the city for its gorgeousness and pomp. The streets were railed and barred from Gracechurch Street to Cheapside at the expense of the livery companies who lined the way,1030 "beginning with base and meane occupations and so ascending to the worshipful crafts." The Goldsmiths of London were especially conspicuous for their marks of loyalty on that day. Their stalls, which were situate by the Old Change at the west end of Chepe, were occupied by fair maidens dressed in white and holding tapers of white wax, whilst priests in their robes stood by with censers of silver and incensed the king and queen as they passed.1031
After three years of indolent and luxurious ease Henry became embroiled in continental troubles. In 1511 a holy league had been formed for the purpose of driving the French out of the Milanese, and Henry's co-operation was desired. A parliament was summoned to meet early in the following year.1032 After granting supplies1033 it unanimously agreed that war should be proclaimed against France. The campaign of 1512 ended ingloriously, and the French[pg 346] king threatened to turn the tables on Henry and to invade England. Henry rose to the occasion and at once set about strengthening his navy. On the 30th January, 1513, he addressed a letter to the Corporation of London desiring them to furnish him with 300 men, the same to be at Greenwich by the 15th February at the latest.1034 Proclamation was thereupon made in the city for all persons who were prepared to join the war to appear at the Guildhall any time before the 10th February, where, if approved, they would be furnished with sufficient harness and weapons, without any charge, and also with sufficient wages at the king's cost.1035
The city was suffering at the time from great scarcity of wheat, and each alderman was called upon to contribute the sum of £5 towards alleviating the distress which prevailed. A contract was made with certain Hanse merchants to furnish the city with 2,000 quarters of wheat and rye respectively by Midsummer-day, whilst the royal purveyors were forbidden to lay hands on wheat, malt or grain entering the port of London.1036 Under the circumstances it could have been no great hardship, but rather an advantage to rid the city of 300 mouths. On the 1st February, 1513, the aldermen were instructed to enquire in their respective wards as to the number of men each ward could furnish, and two days later the livery companies were ordered to find the sum of £300 to defray the expense connected with fitting out the men. If more than £300 were needed they were to draw on the Chamber, but any money not expended out of that[pg 347] sum was to be paid into the Chamber.1037 The companies raised the sum of £405, the Mercers contributing £35, the Grocers, Drapers, Fishmongers and Goldsmiths respectively £30, and the rest sums of smaller amount.1038 There was some difference of opinion as to the nature of the uniform to be worn by the city's contingent. At length it was settled that the soldiers' coats should be white, with a St. George's cross and sword, together with a rose, at the back and the same before. Their shoes were to be left to the discretion of the muster-masters.1039
Henry himself now crossed over to France. The campaign proved more successful than the last, for the French being attacked at Guinegate, were seized with so great a panic that Henry achieved a bloodless victory. From the hasty flight of the French cavalry, the engagement came to be known as the Battle of Spurs. This victory secured the fall of Terouenne and was followed shortly afterwards by the capture of Tournay.
Notwithstanding these successes, however, Henry found it necessary to make peace in the following year. His allies had got what they wanted, and the conquest of France was as far off as ever. It remained only to make as good a bargain as he could. The French king consented to the payment of a large sum of money, in return for which he was given Henry's sister Mary in marriage, although she was already affianced, if not married, to Prince Charles of Castile. This was the work of the king's new minister, Wolsey.
[pg 348]To the apostles of the New Learning—as the revival of letters which commenced in the last reign came to be called—to Erasmus, to Archbishop Warham, to More and to Colet, the war at its outset had been eminently distasteful. With the accession of Henry VIII to the throne they had hoped for better things. War was to be for ever banished and a "new order" was to prevail.
Of its connection with More and Colet the City is justly proud. At the opening of Henry's reign the future lord chancellor was executing the duties of the comparatively unimportant post of under-sheriff or judge of the Poultry Compter, a post which he continued to hold until 1517.1040 He had received his education in the city at St. Antony's School in Threadneedle Street, a school which had already achieved a great reputation and afterwards reckoned among its pupils the famous Whitgift. Later in life he shut himself up for four years in the Charterhouse of London, living a life of devotion and prayer, but without taking any vow.1041
The father of John Colet, Dean of St. Paul's, had taken an active part in municipal life. Henry Colet had been alderman first of Farringdon Ward Without and afterwards of the Wards of Castle Baynard and Cornhill,1042 and as alderman of the last mentioned ward[pg 349] he had died towards the close of 1505. He had served as sheriff in 1477 and as mayor in 1486.
Up to the time of Henry VI education had been carried on in the city chiefly by means of schools attached to the various city churches and religious houses. By order of Henry VI, and at the instigation of four city ministers,1043 grammar schools were established in several parishes. The school of St. Antony attached to the hospital of the same name, of which Dr. John Carpenter was at the time master, received an endowment from Henry VI for the maintenance of scholars at Oxford. The school continued to flourish some time after the dissolution of the hospital. There was also a school attached to the hospital of St. Thomas of Acon, as famous in its day as that of St. Antony, but of which little is known until after the suppression of the religious houses by Henry VIII, when it passed into the hands of the Mercers' Company and became known, as it is to this day, as the Mercers' School.
The Dr. John Carpenter just mentioned must not be confounded with the Town Clerk of that name, the compiler of the famous Liber Albus and the founder of the City of London School. There is little known of the foundation of this latter school beyond the statement made by Stow a century and a-half later, that he "gave tenements to the city for the finding and bringing up of four poor men's children with meat, drink, apparel, learning at the schools in the universities, etc., until they be preferred, and[pg 350] then others in their places for ever."1044 Within the last few years the City Chamberlain's accounts—touching "the lands of Mr. John Carpenter, sometyme commen clarke of this cittie"—have been brought to light, and serve to supplement in a small way Stow's meagre but valuable statement. The rental or amount with which the Chamberlain charged himself for the year 1565 or 1566 is there set down as £41 0s. 4d., and the discharge—embracing a quit rent due to the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, and expenses incurred in overseeing, clothing and feeding four poor children "being founde at scoole and lerning by the bequeste of the sayde Master Carpenter"—amounted to £19 12s. 8d., leaving a balance to the City of £21 7s. 8d.1045 From so modest a beginning arose the school which, situate on the Thames Embankment, now numbers over 700 scholars.
There was a school attached to St. Paul's long before Colet's day, just as there is one now, independent of the school of Colet's foundation, and devoted mainly to the instruction of the Cathedral choristers. Soon after Colet's appointment to the Deanery in 1505 he experienced no little dissatisfaction with the Cathedral School, where great laxity prevailed, more especially in the religious education of the "children of Paul's," and so, about the year 1509—the year of Henry's accession—having recently come into a considerable estate by the death of his father, he set about acquiring a small property situate at the east end of St. Paul's Church for the purpose of establishing another school which would better realise[pg 351] his own ideal of what a school should be than the existing Cathedral School. Colet's School grew apace. In 1511 he was in negotiation with the Court of Aldermen for the purchase "of a certen grounde of the citie for an entre to be hadde into his new gramer scole."1046 By January of the next year (1512) he had succeeded in obtaining the assent both of the Court of Aldermen and Common Council to the purchase by him of a "certen grounde in the Olde Chaunge for the inlargyng of his gramer scole in Powly's Churcheyerd" for the sum of £30.1047 The property was conveyed to him by deed, dated the 27th September, which deed was sealed with the common seal on the 7th October following.1048 The question as to whom he should entrust the management of his school caused Colet no little anxiety. He eventually decided to confide its revenues and management entirely to the Mercers' Company, and when asked the reason for his so doing replied that "though there was nothing certain in human affairs he yet found the least corruption in them."1049
Considerable rivalry existed among the various grammar schools of the city, more especially between the boys of Colet's School and the boys of the more ancient foundation of St. Antony, which, for a long time, had the reputation for turning out the best scholars. Public disputations were held in the open air. The St. Paul's boys meeting St. Antony's boys would derisively call them St. Antony's pigs, that saint being generally represented with a pig following[pg 352] him, and challenge them to a disputation; the latter would retaliate by styling their rivals "pigeons of St. Paul's," from the bird which then, as now, frequented St. Paul's Churchyard. From questions of grammar, writes Stow,1050 they usually fell to blows "with their satchels full of books, many times in great heaps, that they troubled the streets and passengers." After the decay of St. Antony's School the rivalry was taken up, but in a more friendly way, by the later foundation of the Merchant Taylors' School.
But the citizens of London did not limit their efforts in the cause of education to their own city. Throughout the country there are to be found grammar schools which owe their establishment to the liberal-mindedness and open-handed generosity of the city merchant.1051 Their existence bears testimony to the kindly feeling which men who had grown rich in London still bore to the provincial town or village which gave them birth and which they had left in early life to seek their fortune in the great metropolis.
To take but a few instances: Sir John Percival, a merchant-tailor, who in 1487 filled the subordinate office of Lord Mayor's carver, performing his duties so well that the mayor, Sir Henry Colet, nominated him one of the sheriffs for the year ensuing by the time honoured custom of drinking to him at a public dinner, founded a school at Macclesfield. Stephen[pg 353] Jenyns, another merchant-tailor, did the same thing at Wolverhampton. Sir Thomas White, another member of the same company, founded two schools in the provinces, one at Reading and another at Bristol, besides the College of St. John at Oxford. Sir William Harper, yet another merchant-tailor, established a school at Bedford.
The Mercers' Company rivalled the Merchant-Taylors' in the number of schools established in the country through the liberality of its members. Sir John Gresham founded one at Holt, in Norfolk; Sir Rowland Hill, an ancestor of the originator of the Penny Postal scheme, another at Drayton, in Shropshire; whilst schools at Horsham, in Sussex, and West Lavington, in Wiltshire, were erected by two other mercers, Richard Collier and William Dauntsey. There exist at the present day at least four schools which owe their foundation to wealthy members of the Grocers' Company, the well known school at Oundle, co. Northampton, upon which the Company have expended on capital account the sum of £35,000, having been founded by Sir William Laxton; another at Sevenoaks, in Kent, by William Sevenoke, a native of the place, who rose from very humble circumstances to the chief magistracy of the city; another at Witney, in Oxfordshire, by Henry Box, and another at Colwall, co. Hereford, by Humphry Walwyn. Sir Andrew Judd, a member of the Skinners' Company, established a school at Tonbridge, whilst Sir Wolstan Dixie, another skinner, performed the same charitable act at Market Bosworth. Lastly, Sir George Monoux and Thomas Russell, both of them members of the Drapers' Company, founded[pg 354] schools at Walthamstow and at Barton-under-Needwood, co. Stafford, respectively.
On the Feast of St. Matthew (21 Sept.), 1515, a messenger arrived in the city from Wolsey desiring the mayor and aldermen to attend that evening at St. Paul's to return thanks to Almighty God for the queen, who was quick with child. The summons was obeyed,1052 and in the following February (1516) the Princess Mary was born.
By this time Wolsey had risen to be a great power in the State. In 1514 he had been made Archbishop of York, and in the following year a cardinal. His high position as a prince of the Church, as well as his authority with the king, rendered it desirable for the citizens to keep well with him. On the 6th March, 1516, it was resolved to send a deputation to the cardinal for the purpose of securing his favour. No expense was to be spared in the matter, and all costs and charges were to be paid by the Chamber.1053 In the following June the cardinal handed to the mayor a list of abuses in the city which required reform. Sedition was rife there; the commons were disobedient, the statute of apparel was ignored, vagabonds and masterless folk resorted there and unlawful games were allowed in houses. The king's council required an answer on these points within a few days, and an answer was accordingly given, but the purport of it is not recorded, although it was read to the Court of Aldermen before being despatched.1054
In November of the same year (1516) the City was in difficulties with the recently erected Court of[pg 355] Star Chamber, and Wolsey, who practically kept the whole business of government in his own hands, came to the City's assistance with advice. It appears that a subsidy was due on the 21st of this month and the City had not paid its quota. The mayor and aldermen were cited to appear before the cardinal and other lords of the council in the Star Chamber at Westminster. Being asked if they had "sworne for their assayng," to the king's subsidy, the Recorder answered on their behalf that such procedure was contrary to Act of Parliament. The cardinal thereupon advised them to agree to give the king £2,000 in order to be discharged of their oaths "or ells every of theym to be sworn of and uppon the true value of their substance within the sum of 100 marks." This took place on Saturday, the 22nd, and the mayor and aldermen were to give an answer to the Star Chamber by the following Wednesday. On Tuesday, the 25th, the Court of Aldermen met to consider what was best to be done under the circumstances. The decision they arrived at was that as the present assessment was less than the last, they would, in consideration of the king's letters, make up the sum then payable so that it should equal the last assessment.1055
The seditious "brutes" or riots of which Wolsey had complained as daily occurring in the city were soon to assume a serious form. They were occasioned for the most part by the jealousy with which everybody who was not a freeman of the city was looked upon by the free citizen. The influx of strangers and foreigners has been daily increasing, notwithstanding the limitations and restrictions placed upon their[pg 356] residence and mode of trading,1056 whilst the tendency of freemen had been to leave the city for the country.1057
Whilst the civic authorities were doing all they could to prevent the possibility of a disturbance arising on the coming May-day1058—a day kept as a general holiday in the city—occasion was taken by a minister of the church, whose duty it was to preach the usual Spital sermon on Easter Tuesday (14 April), to incite the freemen to rise up against the foreigner and stranger.1059 When the 1st May arrived all might have been well, had not a city alderman allowed his zeal to outrun his discretion. It happened that John Mundy,1060 Alderman of Queenhithe Ward, came across some youngsters playing "at the bucklers" at a time when by a recent order they should have been within doors, and he commanded them to desist. This they showed no disposition to do, and when force was threatened raised the cry for 'prentices and clubs. A large crowd quickly assembled and the alderman had to beat a hasty retreat. The mob, now thoroughly roused, proceeded to set free the prisoners in Newgate and the compters, and to attack the strangers and[pg 357] foreigners quartered at Blanchappleton1061 and elsewhere. Rioting continued throughout the night, but early the following morning they were met by a large force which the mayor in the meantime had collected, and 300 of them were made prisoners, so that by the time that assistance arrived from the court quiet had been restored. A commission of Oyer and Terminer was opened at the Guildhall to try the offenders. John Lincoln, who had not so long ago been appointed surveyor of goods bought and sold by foreigners,1062 was charged with being the instigator of the riot, and being found guilty was hanged in Cheapside, whilst twelve others were hanged on gallows in different parts of the city. Others received the king's pardon with halters round their necks in token of the fate they deserved.1063
The civic authorities were not unnaturally anxious to make their peace with the king, and to disclaim any complicity in the late outbreak. The Court of Aldermen met on the 11th May to consider how best to approach his majesty on so delicate a subject. It was decided to send a deputation to the lord cardinal to "feel his mind" as to the number of persons that should appear before the king. The next day eight aldermen and the Recorder were nominated by the court "to go the Kinges grace and to knowe his plesure when the Mayr and Aldremen[pg 358] and diverse of the substancyall commoners of this citie shall sue to beseche his grace to be good and gracious lord un to theym and to accept theym nowe beyng most sorrowful and hevye for thees late attemptates doon ayeynst their wylles."1064
The deputation forthwith proceeded, clothed in gowns of black, to Greenwich, whither the king had gone on the 11th May. The Recorder as usual acted as spokesman, and humbly prayed the royal forgiveness for the negligence displayed by the mayor in not keeping the king's peace within the city. The king in reply told them plainly his opinion that the civic authorities had winked at the whole business, and referred them to Cardinal Wolsey, his chancellor, who would declare to them his pleasure.1065 With this answer the deputation withdrew and reported what had taken place to the mayor, who had wisely kept away. It was clear that above all things the favour of the cardinal had to be obtained. For this purpose a committee was appointed, whose duty it was to "devise what thinges of plesur shalbe geven to my lord Cardynall and to other of the lordes as they shall thynk convenient for their benevolences doon concernyng this last Insurreccioun."1066 By the 22nd May matters had evidently been accommodated. On that date the king sat at Westminster Hall in great state, surrounded by the lords of his council and attended by the cardinal. The mayor and aldermen and chief commoners of the city, chosen from the leading civic companies,1067 had arrived by nine o'clock in the morning clad in their best liveries, "according[pg 359] as the cardinal had commanded them."1068 Wolsey knew the king's weakness for theatrical display. At Henry's command all the prisoners were brought into his presence. They appeared, to the number of 400 men and eleven women, all with ropes round their necks. After the cardinal had administered a rebuke to the civic authorities for their negligence, and had declared that the prisoners had deserved death, a formal pardon was proclaimed by the king, the cardinal exhorting all present to loyalty and obedience. It was some time before the effects of the late outbreak disappeared. Compensation for losses had to be made;1069 some were bound over to keep the peace;1070 and counsel were employed to draw up a statement of the points of grievance between the citizens and merchant strangers for submission to the king.1071 In September there were rumours of another outbreak, but the civic authorities were better prepared than formerly, and effectually stopt any such attempt by putting suspected persons into prison.
Lest any unfavourable report should reach the cardinal, the Recorder and another were ordered to ride in all haste to Sion, where Wolsey was thought to be, and if they failed to find him there, to follow him to Windsor and to report to him the active measures that had been taken to prevent any further insurrection in the city.1072 "Evil May-day" was long remembered by the citizens, who raised objection to Thomas Semer or Seymer, who had been sheriff at the[pg 360] time, being elected mayor ten years later.1073 In May, 1547, all householders were straitly charged not to permit their servants any more to go maying, but to keep them within doors.1074
With gibbets all over the city, each bearing a ghastly freight, and the summer approaching, it is scarcely surprising that the city should soon again be visited with an epidemic. "At the city gates," wrote an eye-witness, "one sees nothing but gibbets and the quarters of these wretches"—the wretches who had been hanged for complicity in the late disturbance—"so that it is horrible to pass near them."1075 The "sweating sickness," which had again made its appearance in 1516, and had never really quitted the city (except for a few weeks in winter), now raged more violently than ever, accompanied by measles and small-pox. The king ordered all inhabitants of infected houses to keep indoors and hang out wisps of straw, and when compelled to walk abroad to carry white rods.1076 This order, however, was badly received in the city and gave rise to much murmuring and dissatisfaction.1077 The civic authorities did what they could to mitigate the evil by driving out beggars and vagabonds, and removing slaughter-houses outside the city walls,1078 as well as by administering relief to the poorer classes by the distribution of tokens or licences[pg 361] to solicit alms. These tokens consisted of round "beedes" of white tin, bearing the City's arms in the centre, to be worn on the right shoulder.1079 In the midst of so much real suffering, there were not wanting those who took advantage of the charitable feeling which the crisis called forth and were not ashamed to gain a livelihood by simulating illness. Such a one was Miles Rose, who on the 11th March, 1518, openly confessed before the Court of Aldermen that he had frequently dissembled the sickness of the "fallyng evyle" (or epilepsy) in divers parish churches in the city, on which occasions "jemewes" of silver, called cramp rings, would as often as not be placed on his fingers by charitable passers-by, with which he would quickly make off, pocketing at the same time many a twopence which had been bestowed upon him.1080
The city could scarcely have recovered its wonted appearance after the ravages of the pestilence before its streets were enlivened with one of those magnificent displays for which London became justly famous, the occasion being an embassy from the French king sent to negotiate a marriage treaty between Henry's daughter Mary, a child but two years of age, and the still younger Dauphin of France. The City Records, strange to say, appear to be altogether silent on this subject, and yet the embassy, for magnificent display, was such as had never been seen within its walls before. We can understand that the embassy was not acceptable to the thrifty middle-class trading burgess, when we read that it was accompanied[pg 362] by a swarm of pedlars and petty hucksters who showed an unbecoming anxiety to do business in hats, caps and other merchandise, which under colour of the embassy had been smuggled into the country duty free.1081 The foreign retail trader was at the best of times an abomination to the free burgess, and this sharp practice on the part of the Frenchmen, coming so soon after the recent outburst against strangers on Evil May-day, only served to accentuate his animosity—"At this dooing mannie an Englishman grudged, but it availed not."1082 The ambassadors were lodged at the Merchant Taylors' Hall, which, owing to the ill-timed action of the French pedlars, had the look of a mart. On Sunday, the 3rd October, the king, with a train of 1,000 mounted gentlemen richly dressed, attended by the legates and foreign ambassadors, went in procession to St. Paul's to hear mass; after which the king took his oath—a ceremonial which the French admiral declared to be "too magnificent for description." On the following Tuesday (5 Oct.) the marriage ceremony—so far as it could be carried out between such infants—was celebrated at Greenwich, and a tiny gold ring, in which was a valuable diamond, placed upon Mary's finger.1083